The best thing I've read all week

I might be biased thanks to my line of work but this spoke to me:

"The women are also dressed in period threads, and many have big Afros. I am happy to say it brings back an element sadly missing in recent movies, gratuitous nudity. Sexy women would "happen" to be topless in the 1970s movies for no better reason than that everyone agreed, including themselves, that their breasts were a genuine pleasure to regard -- the most beautiful naturally occurring shapes in nature, I believe. Now we see breasts only in serious films, for expressing reasons. There's been such a comeback for the strategically positioned bed sheet, you'd think we were back in the 1950s." - Roger Ebert, "Black Dynamite"; Chicago Sun-Times

When online ads attack

This unholy mess is on People.com* right now:

(Click to embiggen)

I hate rollover ads to begin with since they inevitably (purposely?) cause the user to accidentally expand the ad, covering the content of the page (where the real value resides).

But this ad from American Cancer Society (which isn't even in its expanded state) coupled with the subscription ad prevents me from reading the headline and what looks to be the first 2.5 paragraphs of the story. That's bad enough, but there's nothing I can do to get rid of the subscription ad since the American Cancer Society ad is covering the Close button I assume is in the top right corner of the subscription ad. You can't click-and-drag the People ad anywhere and can't shrink the ACS ad to get access to the close button.

Does refreshing the page get rid of both ads? Yes. But that's a lousy user experience, I'd say.

Yeesh.
* Save your judgment. I clicked a friend's link via Twitter, I wasn't looking for the latest Jon and Kate update.

Stephen Colbert sums up the Chicago music scene

So THAT'S why we didn't get the Olympics:

Twitter doesn't leak off the record comments, people do

"There’s no such thing as ‘off the record’ with Twitter."
- Lost Remote*

I don't know if Cory Bergman is serious about that statement or using it for a clever headline, but he's wrong. That's like saying "There's no such thing as 'off the record' with notebooks." Or typewriters. Or computers. Or vocal chords.

Twitter is a tool for journalism. When you're a journalist acting in said capacity, you're operating under the same set of ethics as when you're in the newsroom, on the phone with a source or in any of other traditional setting.

NBCChicago.com even sadder now

Michael Miner of the Chicago Reader discusses NBCChicago.com's new redesign in a larger story about what happens when errors are introduced as you "collate and synthesize the news."** (Those are the words of NBCChicago.com's managing editor, not Miner.)

On the redesign, which incorporates a poll on each story that asks users how they feel, Miner says:

"Stunts like this pander to the public in order to attract the elusive online advertiser...That's the voice of a utility, not a news medium. When every news medium sounds like this, who will we count on for serious journalism?"

I don't know if Miner realizes it, but every one of NBC's local news sites "sounds" like this thanks to rolling out this redesign across all their local sites. The better question is, "When every online news medium looks like this, how does your local news coverage differentiate itself?" Certainly not by treating them like network affiliates. (The "Rock Stars on the Rampage" photo gallery is a "lead story" on three of NBC Chicago's sites right now and don't get me started on its "Local Beat" section.)

More on the NBCChicago.com redesign from me last month.

** I don't mean to say this happens every time someone blogs about a story. There are plenty of talented people who do this and manage to get the details right.

Why are so many journo/media panels full of white guys

The Windy Citizen is hosting an interesting discussion about the diversity - or lack thereof - in "future of media" panels. To some it's simply a case of organizers only seeking out white men. To others - myself included - it's more complicated than that. Even those who seek to put women and persons of color on their panels - again, myself included - find themselves challenged.

Read more here (my expanded thoughts on this topic specifically as it relates to the CMFC here and here).

Mayor Daley apologizes for something he didn't do

"Even if privatizing the parking meters was the best alternative, the key issue would be whether the administration, starting with Mayor Daley, followed a process to ensure that the most qualified people available conducted the most sophisticated analysis possible to come up with the best agreement for taxpayers.

Mayor Daley has yet to tell his constituents that this happened. And it's going to be hard for him to do so, because all evidence available suggests that it didn't."

- Mick Dumke "Mayor Daley is sorry that we don't like the parking meter deal", chicagoreader.com

What's always struck me about the Mayor is that even people who don't like his policies say they come away with positive feelings about him after they have a personal encounter with him. (I'm one of those people.) I think that's why so many folks roll over for the guy, particularly reporters. Glad Dumke is more clear-eyed than the rest of us.